Lisa A. Kirby, Ph.D.

LAKirby@ncwc.edu

Education

Summer Institute      Youngstown State University                                                                        July 2006

Center for Working-Class Studies

“Class in the Classroom: Strategies and Resources                        

for Teaching about Working-Class Life and Culture”                    

Ph.D.                         Texas Christian University                                                     August 2003

Ph.D. with Distinction , English                                                                  

                                    Major emphases: 20th-Century American Literature, Working-

Class Studies, Composition Studies, Women’s Literature

                                    Comprehensive exam areas: American Modernist Fiction, Working-

Class Poetry, Women Writers and Feminist Theory

Dissertation: Renegotiating Radicalism: The Complexities of

                                                        Politics, Gender, and Race in the Chronicling of

       1930s and 1940s Working-Class Experience

M.A.                           University of Nebraska-Lincoln                                                August 1998

                                    Major: English, American Literature

                                    Thesis: The Reunion of Gender and Radicalism: Working-Class

                                                Women and Authenticity in American Proletarian Writings

B.A.                             Texas Christian University                                                     May 1997

Majors: English and Political Science

Minor: History

            Phi Beta Kappa

Magna Cum Laude

Successful Completion of TCU Honors Program

Honors Thesis: The Reunion of Nature and Spirituality: The Writings

of Annie Dillard, Terry Tempest Williams, and Teresa

Jordan

Publications

• “Federal Arts Project, Federal Theater Project, Federal Writers’ Project, Jack Conroy, Meridel Le Sueur, Grace Lumpkin, and Alexander Saxton.” Entries in Encyclopedia of American Counterculture. M.E. Sharpe, Inc. Forthcoming 2007.

• “Interrogating Suburbia in The Virgin Suicides.” Academic Exchange Quarterly.  Special issue on Teaching the Novel and Short Fiction. Spring 2007.

• Review of Selfe and Hawisher’s Literate Lives in the Information Age: Narratives on Literacy from the United States for Resource Center for Cyberculture Studies. December 2006.

• “Shades of Passing: Teaching and Interrogating Identity in Roth’s The Human Stain and Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.” Philip Roth Studies. Fall 2006.

• Review of Meade’s Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin: Writers Running Wild in the Twenties—Edna St. Vincent Millay, Dorothy Parker, Zelda Fitzgerald, and Edna Ferber for Women Writers: A Zine. Summer 2006.

• Review of Allison’s Skin: Talking about Sex, Class, and Literature in Sobriquet Magazine: An Independent Journal of Literature, Film, Music, and Ideas April 2006.

• “The Figure of the Domestic and Work.” Entries in Writing African American Women: An Encyclopedia of Literature by and about Women of Color. Greenwood Press. 2006.

• Review of Zandy’s Hands: Physical Labor, Class, and Cultural Work in Working USA: The Journal of Labor and Society. September 2005.

• “Navigating Class: Making a Space for the Working Class in Composition.” Indiana English. Special issue on “Teaching Diversity.” Fall 2002.

• Review of Hapke’s Labor’s Text: The Worker in American Fiction in Left History: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Historical Inquiry and Debate. Fall 2002.

• “Women in the Yards: The Oral Histories and Rhetorical Strategies of Women Packinghouse Workers.” Oregon English Journal. Spring 2002.

• Review of Lauter and Fitzgerald’s Literature, Class, and Culture in Workplace 4.1: A Journal of Academic Labor. Summer 2001.

• “‘So the storm passed...’: Exploring Notions of Feminism and Nationhood in Chopin's ‘At the ‘Cadian Ball’ and ‘The Storm.’” (Proposal accepted for a collection titled Kate Chopin in the Twenty-First Century: New Critical Essays; collection in contract with Cambridge Scholars Publishing)

• A Class of Our Own: Teaching the Literature of the Working Class. Ed. Laura Hapke and Lisa A. Kirby. (Collection in contract with Cambridge Scholars Publishing)

• “Race among the Radicals: Complicating and Teaching Working-Class and Racial Politics in John Sanford’s The People from Heaven.” A Class of Our Own: Teaching the Literature of the Working Class. Eds. Laura Hapke and Lisa A. Kirby. 25 ms. pages. (Essay accepted; collection in contract with Cambridge Scholars Publishing)

• “A Radical Revisioning: Understanding and Repositioning The Grapes of Wrath as Political ‘Propaganda’.” (Under review for a collection in Rodopi’s Dialogue Series)
   

• “‘How it grieves the heart of a mother [ . . . ]’: Gendered and Socioeconomic Radicalism in Grace Lumpkin’s To Make My Bread.” (Under review with Women’s Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal)

• “Discussing Plagiarism: Resisting the Culture of Fear and Promoting Success.” (Essay accepted for a collection titled Understanding Plagiarism: Discussions for Students and Teachers)

•  “‘No Irish Need Apply’: Comparing Ethnic Stereotypes in Crane’s Maggie and Norris’s McTeague to Contemporary Attitudes of Discrimination.” (Under review for collection, Poor White, Redneck, and Trash: Working-Class in US Culture)

Presentations

• “Teaching Class: Working-Class Studies in Theory and Practice.” Fourth Monday Research Colloquium. North Carolina Wesleyan College. March 26, 2007.

• “Redefining Academic ‘Success’: Teaching Writers of Varying Abilities at the Small College.” Conference on College Composition and Communication. New York. March 24, 2007.

• “Ph.D.= Packinghouse Daughter: Reflecting on the Socioeconomic, Academic, and Feminist in Cheri Register’s Packinghouse Daughter.” Society for the Study of American Women Writers Conference. Philadelphia, PA. November 9, 2006.

• “‘So the storm passed...’: Exploring Notions of Feminism and Nationhood in Chopin's ‘At the ‘Cadian Ball’ and ‘The Storm.’” South Central Modern Language Association Conference. Dallas, TX. October 27, 2006.

• “Strategies for Building Successful Résumés and Cover Letters: A Workshop.” Student African American Brotherhood Chapter Meeting. North Carolina Wesleyan College. September 25, 2006.

• “The Freshman Writing Experience at North Carolina Wesleyan College.” North Carolina Wesleyan College Parents’ Weekend. Rocky Mount, NC. September 23, 2006.

• “. . . the sideshow my body had become: Women’s Bodies as Sites of Postcolonial Discourse in the Writings of Alice Walker.” Cultural Studies Association Conference. George Mason University. Arlington, VA. April 21, 2006.

• “‘Can You Fix My Commas?’: Battling the ‘Editor Stereotype in Writing Center Instruction.” Southeastern Writing Center Association Conference. University of North Carolina and Duke University. Chapel Hill, NC. February 17, 2006.

• “Discussing Plagiarism: Resisting the Culture of Fear and Promoting Success.” Originality, Imitation, and Plagiarism: A Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Writing. University of Michigan, Sweetland Writing Center. Ann Arbor, MI. September 25, 2005.

• “125 Students and Counting.” Conference on College Composition and Communication. San Francisco, CA. March 23, 2005.

• “Shades of Passing: Interrogating Racial and Socioeconomic Masking in Roth’s The Human Stain and Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.” Race, Gender, and Class Conference. New Orleans, LA. September 24, 2005.

• “Discussing Plagiarism: Abandoning Policies and Rules.” North Carolina Wesleyan College Writer’s Day. Rocky Mount, NC. September 20, 2005.

• “Activists for the Nation: Exploring the Margins of Race and Class in the Harlem Federal Writers’ Project.” Presenter and Panel Chair. MELUS Conference. San

Antonio, TX. March 10-13, 2004.

·         “New Realities: Meridel Le Sueur and the Possibilities of Modernism in Representing the Working Class.” Society for the Study of American Women Writers. Fort Worth, TX. September 26-28, 2003.

• “Designing and Teaching Literature and Upper-Division Rhetoric Classes: Revising Syllabi.” TCU Graduate Instructor Workshop. Fort Worth, TX. January 28, 2003.

• “Breaking the Silence: The Intersections of Public and Private History in Cheri Register’s Packinghouse Daughter.” American Literature Association Conference. Long Beach, CA. May 31, 2002.

• “Navigating Class: Making a Space for the Working Class in Composition.” Conference on College Composition and Communication. Chicago, IL. March 21, 2002.

• “The Reunion of Gender and Radicalism: Authenticity in the Fiction of Meridel Le Sueur.” Conference for the Center of Working-Class Studies. Youngstown, OH. May 16-19, 2001.

• “The Media and Identity Construction in DeLillo’s White Noise.” Popular Culture Association in the South and the American Culture Association in the South, Nashville, TN. October 6, 2000.

• “Envisioning Working Class/Re-envisioning Literature.” EGAD Graduate Conference, Texas A&M—Commerce, Commerce, TX. July 8, 2000.

• “The Media-Constructed Self in Less Than Zero.” Schreiner College Popular Culture Symposium, Kerrville, TX. November 6, 1999.

Awards and Honors

• The Leslie H. and Evelyn G. Garner Faculty Leadership Award, Research Grant, February 2006
• Young Careerist Award, Business and Professional Women Organization, Rocky Mount Local Chapter, March 2005
• NCWC Professional Development Committee Grant, February 2005, November 2005, December 2006
• Ph.D. with Distinction, completed written dissertation and oral defense with distinction, July 15, 2003
• MLA Travel Grant, awarded financial assistance to attend the MLA Conference, 2002
• AddRan Graduate Instructor Teaching Award, awarded to one graduate instructor from the Department of English each year, 2002
• Nokia Research Award, awarded to one graduate student at TCU for a research project related to women’s issues, 2002
• The Women's Wednesday Club Essay Prize, first place, “Sarah Wentworth Morton and American Reformism,” TCU Creative Writing Awards, February 2002
• The William L. Adams Writing Center Prize for the best essay about rhetoric and composition, first place, “Navigating Class: Making a Place for the Working Class in Composition,” TCU Creative Writing Awards, February 2002
• Comprehensive Exams, Passed with Distinction, completed both written and oral qualifying exams with distinction, September 2001; exam areas: American Modernist Fiction, Women Writers and Feminist Theory, Working-Class Poetry
• Lilla Thomas Award for Interpretive/Critical Essay on Feminist Writers/Issues, second place, “The Body as Site of Postcolonial Discourse: The Fiction of Alice Walker,” TCU Creative Writing Awards, April 2001
• Roger Rollin Award for Best Student Paper, runner-up, “The Media-Constructed Self in DeLillo’s White Noise,” PCAS Conference, October 2000.

·         Phi Beta Kappa, Texas Christian University, 1997

• Sigma Tau Delta, English honor society, 1996-97; President of Chi Alpha chapter, 1997

Teaching Experience

·         Assistant Professor of English, Division of Humanities, North Carolina Wesleyan College, August 2004-present

·         Professor, Department of English, Collin County Community College, Spring Creek Campus, August 2003-June 2004

       Graduate Instructor, Department of English, Texas Christian University, August 1998-December 2003

Courses Taught

·         Composition

                        Basic Reading and Writing

                        Introductory Composition

                        Intermediate Composition

                        Advanced Composition: Thinking and Writing about the Global Community

·         Literature

                        Introduction to Literature

World Literature I

Major American Writers: Modernism and American Fiction

Major American Writers: Racial and Socioeconomic Passing in 20^th-Century

American Fiction

American Literature II

Studies in Genre:  American Working-Class Literature

Studies in Genre:  The Literature of Immigration

Studies in Genre:  Working-Class Literature

Studies in Genre:  The American Experience

Senior Seminar (Fall 2007)

Honors Thesis: Upper-Class and Working-Class Women’s Struggles in the

Writings of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Kate Chopin, and Dorothy Allison

·         Communications

                        Fundamentals of Communication

Business Communication

·         Other

College 101: Introduction to College Life

Administrative, Tutoring, Evaluative, and Editorial Experience 

• Professional Tutor, NCWC Writing Lab, 2006-present
• AP Reader, English Language Exam, Summer 2006
• Writing Center Consultant, Collin County Community College, August 2003-December 2003
• Associate Director of Composition, Texas Christian University, Fall 2001-Fall 2002
• Editorial Assistant, Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies, 2001-present
• Writing Center Specialist, Texas Christian University, 2000-2002
• Associate Project Editor, Harcourt College Publishers, 1998-2000
• Editorial Assistant, Prairie Schooner  literary journal, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 1997-1998
• Research Assistant, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 1997-1998

Online Experience 

• Trained in Blackboard, WebCT, eCollege and Campus Cruiser
• Online E-structor, Smarthinking, a group that assists high school and college students in both synchronous and asynchronous online writing labs, 2001-2003
• Online Writing Tutor, Texas Tech University Writing Center Interactive Project, a program that assisted elementary and middle school students with their writing in preparation for the TAAS test, 2000-2003

Professional/College Service

• At-Large Representative, Faculty Council, NCWC, 2007-2009
• Humanities Division Representative, NCWC Majors/Minors Fair, March 19, 2007
• Political Science Search Committee, NCWC, Spring 2007
• Co-Chair , English Department Search Committee, NCWC, Spring 2007
• Vice President of Academic Affairs/Dean of the College Search Committee, NCWC, 2006-present
• Curriculum Committee, NCWC, 2006-present
• PALS Summer Orientation Leader Interview Committee, Spring 2006
• Faculty Presentation, Building the Future Campaign Kick-Off Event, March 1, 2006
• Jefferson-Pilot Professorship Selection Committee, NCWC, Spring 2006
• Sociology Search Committee, NCWC, Spring 2006
• Faculty Steering Committee, NCWC Building the Future Campaign, 2005-2006
• Faculty Advisor for English Majors, NCWC, 2005-present
• NCTE Opinion Forum, 2005-present
• Attendance at “Fostering Critical Thinking and Mature Valuing Across the Curriculum,” Faculty Development Workshop, 2005

• Faculty Advisor , Habitat for Humanity, NCWC, 2005-present
• Co-Coordinator , Fourth Monday Research Colloquium, NCWC, 2005-
• Writing Program Committee, NCWC , 2005-2006
• Science Fair Judge, NCWC , April 2005, April 2006
• Collin County Academic Plan Review Committee, 2003-2004
• Collin County Composition/Rhetoric I Textbook Committee, 2003-2004
• Collin County Community College Women’s Alliance, 2003-2004
• Graduate Student Representative, TCU English Department, 2001-2002

·    Graduate Advisory Committee, Student Representative, 2001-2002

·    TCU Composition Committee, Student Representative, 2000-2002

• TCU Graduate Mentoring Program, Mentor, 2000-2002

Community Service

• Nominating Committee, BPW, 2007-present
• Volunteer, TCU Alumni Career Connections, 2006-present
• Coordinator, BPW Membership Drive at NCWC, 2006-present
• Volunteer, Katrina: One Year Later Benefit, September 14, 2006
• Community Judge, Nash-Rocky Mount High Schools Constitution Day Essay Contest,

Nash Central High School, October 21, 2005

• Bridge Benefit Volunteer, Rocky Mount BPW, 2005-2006
• Young Careerist Committee Chair, Rocky Mount BPW, 2005-present
• Member, Business and Professional Women (BPW), Rocky Mount Chapter, 2005-
• Salvation Army Bell Ringer, NCWC, December 2004, December 2005
• Volunteer Grant Writer, Heart House, a non-profit organization that provides a

safe, after-school environment to at-risk, inner-city children in Dallas, 2001

Professional Memberships

• Charlotte Perkins Gilman Society
• Cultural Studies Association
• Modern Language Association
• National Council of Teachers of English
• Rebecca Harding Davis Society
• Society for the Study of American Women Writers            
• South Central Modern Language Association
• Southeastern Writing Center Association
• Working-Class Studies Association